Review for The falconeer. Game for PC, Xbox One and Xbox Series X, the video game was released on 10/11/2020
Resist the temptation to leave The Falconeer after an hour. As you can see from the vote attached to this review, we were certainly not thrilled with the game released by Wired Productions in recent days for PC and Xbox Series X / S / One, but you must at least give it a chance after overcoming the first obstacles and a really approach badly studied, because it has some qualities and it proves to be an at least interesting title. Especially considering the premises.
We said premise, because you must know that The Falconeer was developed by a single person, the good Tomas Sala who in his Amsterdam office rolled up his sleeves to give Xbox one of the very few "exclusives" of the launch and to the world a new exponent in a sub-genre, that of the "flying" shooters that just recently returned to the deep space of the excellent Star Wars: Squadrons. Without the due proportions and justifications of an indie product that cannot be more indie, The Falconeer shows all its independent production limits in more and more frustrating moments, but in the end he takes home the sufficiency thanks to so much, so much personality.
Unpredictable flights and very fast ascents
The Falconeer will catapult us astride a giant hawk armed to the teeth into the skies that fly over the Ursee, a sea, decidedly different from the Adriatic, which covers the entirety of a mysterious world that sometimes it recalls Kevin Costner's mythical Waterworld, sometimes a fantasy more classic, complete with temples and altars dedicated to its deities. There is a lot of lore and a lot of history in The Falconeer, almost surprisingly; we meet her both as we make our way through the main missions of its 6 chapters, and when we push ourselves to explore its open world map, looking for new settlements to conquer or trade with (and little else, certainly the game could offer us more reasons to inspect every corner).
We were talking about a complex and confused approach, and The Falconeer in fact is a complex and confusing game in its entirety, full of mechanics explained badly, badly or very badly, or even not at all, which accompany a gameplay loop that works only in part, because commanding your own hawk in the skies becomes even pleasant after a few minutes, taking advantage of the updrafts and a set of elementary controls, when the action becomes more intense and we will have to face one of the - many - fire encounters with elements of one of the four factions with which we will collide, repetitiveness and mediocrities emerge overwhelmingly.
Inaudible trajectories
The Falconeer presents gods sudden and unmotivated peaks of difficulty that will force you to repeat some missions from the beginning just because you have found yourself for a moment in the wrong place at the wrong time. Which wouldn't be a problem in itself, but when almost every mission will remember the other (types range from "destroy all" to "escort this ship" or "free the outpost") and there are no checkpoints, the situation can lead to frustration in an instant. And all this especially in the very first hours as mentioned, before having leveled your bird a little (again, you will realize after a while that there are levels like in an RPG) or having equipped it with new weapons or mutations ( performance-altering chemical modifiers).
After you've probably completed the first chapter and gained some new trinkets, however, things will generally tend to become more accessible (invest in particular in the health and regeneration of your steed) and, consequently, more enjoyable. The fights will remain the less successful part of the game, given the very few tactical options beyond taking advantage of the aim assist, going around the enemies and shooting with the only available weapon.
Codes of existential geometry
If in so many elements then, from the tiny UI, to the lack of tutorials, to the emptiness of the game world up to the frustrating gameplay, the Wired Productions production does not take flight (haha, ed), we have to say a few words about how good it is to see The Falconeer instead, and how masterfully you use HDR and manage to perform at a very stable 60fps on any Xbox console you play (even if the actual 4K and 120fps support is reserved only for early adopters of Xbox Series X, as imaginable) . To think that this sea so lush and full of fantastic colors was made by a single person and his PC shocked us every time we started flying towards the horizon.
Having said all this, we will somehow remember The Falconeer for years. Because an indie production of this type did not need such a complex plot, such a complex world as Ursee and such good graphics. But it has them, and it's not cheap. Of course, one could instead redirect the energies to clarify and refine many old or unclear mechanics or improve the variety of firefights, but it certainly cannot be said that this game does not have a soul and therefore, especially if love the genre, after all it does not deserve to be explored. Like its always stormy sea.
► The Falconeer is a Shooter-indie type game developed by Tomas Sala and published by Wired Productions for PC, Xbox One and Xbox Series X, the video game was released on 10/11/2020